Chapter 6 - The name tore through the darkness.Caleb.
Calla's brother.
Emma pushed forward.
“Caleb!”
Detective Hayes grabbed her.
“Stay behind me.”
A flashlight snapped on.
The beam swept across the corridor.
Nothing.
Then they heard footsteps running away.
Daniel chased them.
“Stop!”
He reached the end of the tunnel.
A door slammed.
He opened it.
Empty.
No person.
No child.
Only an old service elevator.
Its doors were slowly closing.
Daniel jammed his arm between them.
The elevator stopped.
Inside was a small shoe.
Calla recognized it.
She had seen it before.
In the video.
A small black sneaker.
“That's Caleb's.”
Emma took it.
Her hands shook.
“He was here.”
Detective Hayes examined the elevator.
“This shaft connects to the main house?”
Daniel nodded slowly.
“My father had an old wine cellar under the garage.”
“Could there be another exit?”
“Yes.”
“Then we search every inch.”
The search continued until dawn.
No child.
No stranger.
No hidden room.
Nothing.
But the shoe remained.
And inside it, Detective Hayes found something.
A tiny paper strip.
Three words.
HE REMEMBERS YOU.
Emma sat down.
“What does that mean?”
Daniel stared at her.
“You tell me.”
Emma shook her head.
“I don't know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I've been locked away for eleven months!”
“And before that?”
Emma looked away.
“What were you doing all those years?”
Her silence lasted too long.
Calla noticed.
“Mom?”
Emma closed her eyes.
“I was looking for him.”
“Caleb?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you come home?”
Emma's voice broke.
“Because every time I got close, someone threatened you.”
Daniel stepped forward.
“Who?”
Emma finally answered.
“A woman named Vivian.”
Drea had mentioned nobody named Vivian.
Detective Hayes wrote it down.
“Who is Vivian?”
Emma whispered:
“I don't know her last name.”
“But you've seen her?”
“Yes.”
“How often?”
“Three times.”
“When?”
“The first time was six years ago.”
“The second?”
“Two years later.”
“And the third?”
Emma looked toward the broken pool house.
“Eleven months ago.”
Daniel frowned.
“That was when you disappeared from wherever you were.”
Emma nodded.
“She found me again.”
“Where were you?”
Emma swallowed.
“Living in a shelter.”
Daniel stared.
“You were alive all this time?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you contact Calla?”
“Because I got a letter.”
“What letter?”
Emma reached into the pocket of her robe.
She had kept it for years.
The paper was old.
Daniel unfolded it.
CONTACT YOUR DAUGHTER AND SHE DIES.
Below it was a photograph.
Calla asleep in her childhood bedroom.
Taken from inside the house.
Daniel's hands tightened around the paper.
“Someone was watching us.”
Emma nodded.
“That was the point.”
Drea had insisted on moving into their old house six years ago.
At the time, Daniel had believed she was helping him recover.
Now he remembered something else.
Drea had known exactly where Calla kept her stuffed rabbit.
She had known which nights Calla had nightmares.
She had known details Daniel had never told her.
Detective Hayes suddenly asked:
“Where was Drea before she married you?”
Daniel frowned.
“I don't know.”
The detective looked at him.
“You never checked?”
He shook his head.
That answer haunted him.
Then his phone buzzed.
A text.
Unknown number.
A photograph appeared.
Drea entering a hospital.
The date was six years ago.
Underneath:
ASK HER WHAT SHE DID IN ROOM 214.
Daniel stared at the screen.
Emma saw the image.
Her face turned white.
“I know that hospital.”
“Why?”
“Because that's where Caleb was born.”
Everyone went silent.
Daniel looked at the photograph again.
Drea was walking through the hospital corridor.
And beside her was an older man.
Daniel recognized him instantly.
His father.
Dead for four years.
May you like
The message below appeared seconds later.
YOUR FATHER DIDN'T ACT ALONE.
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